


Lovebugs

by awstensnewwave



Category: Waterparks (Band)
Genre: Chronic Illness, F/M, yes this is a het fanfic im gross ik
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-27
Updated: 2020-05-24
Packaged: 2021-03-02 00:14:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,416
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23876011
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/awstensnewwave/pseuds/awstensnewwave
Summary: Awsten has been hiding something. Something serious.He also falls in love. It's about as awkward and insecure as any teenage romance is.But some secrets can't be hidden forever.
Relationships: OC - Relationship, awsten knight & oc
Comments: 4
Kudos: 8





	1. Life is Puke

**Author's Note:**

> TW for/  
> Blood, illness, hospitals, all stuff relating to that.

Awsten didn’t know what the fuck was happening with his body. 

For the last couple of days, he had been in a weird haze of discomfort; a weird lingering pain-like sensation bubbling in his stomach, a sudden distaste for the foods that he used to love eating, and a near-constant urge to just simply lay down literally anywhere and fall asleep at any given moment. 

Still, despite the sensations, he still tried his best to continue his life as normal. 

He went to all his sports, ate the foods that he was served at dinner, and made sure to not turn off his light until eleven PM - the time he usually went to sleep, as to not draw any attention from his parents. 

He didn’t think that much about it, honestly. The feelings were definitely weird and _unusual_ , especially for someone as healthy and active as he was, but they weren’t affecting his life _that_ badly. It was just an annoying thing that, after a few weeks, he learnt to live with. Maybe it was a growth spurt coming along? Awsten’s Mom had always said that he was due one ‘any day now’, so maybe this is what bodies felt like before they started to grow..? His Mom was a Health Teacher, after all, so he knew that he could ask her anything to do with the human body and she would have the answer, but…

But he just did not want to ask about  _ this!  _

He knew that she would just turn around and say that it was a growth spurt and that he was overthinking it like he always did. 

Yeah. Awsten had a problem with overthinking, for sure. Ever since he was a kid and could form sentences, he would always be questioning things that deviated the slightest inch away from his routine. Whenever they were in the car, for example, and took a slightly different route, a flurry of ‘what’, ‘why’, and ‘how comes’ would come tumbling out of his mouth until they were on his house’s driveway. 

So him overthinking something as normal and every day as a teenage growth spurt wasn’t a stretch. 

“Awsten?” He got snapped out of his slumber with a jolt. “Awsten? A-Are you alright-?” His Mom was standing over his bed, confused. Awsten always woke up before his alarm went off, he was good like that, but today? He had straight-up slept through his clock, and now there were only twenty minutes before the bus came - not enough time to shower, eat breakfast, clean his teeth, get dressed and walk the five minutes down to the end of the street where the stop was. 

“Wha-” Awsten himself was confused, too. And slightly anxious. He glanced over at the LED screen flashing up beside him. “What?!” Okay. He was full-blown terrified. “F-Fu-Uh, crap! What?! M-Mom-” A sudden wave of pain smacked him tight in the centre of his guts. It felt like his intestines had tangled up within themselves during the night, pulling his abdominal muscles down and sucking the life outta’ them. He forcefully bit down on his bottom lip, to stop the flurry of swears that were about to slip out, as his arms wrapped themselves around his stomach. 

“Do y’think you got a bug?” She placed the back of her hand to his forehead. It didn’t feel all that hot; it was warm, sure, but it wasn’t fever-like hot, it just felt like he had been sleeping underneath the covers all night. Still, his face had paled and it was obvious that his stomach was in some kind of distress. “Hey, why don’t you go to the bathroom, okay? Sort yourself out?”

“I’m fine, Mom.” He mumbled. Mixing in with the pain were tendrils of embarrassment. He hated, absolutely hated, talking about anything _bathroom-related_ with anybody, let alone his own mother! “I-I just need a, uh, an Advil or something. I’ll be fine, I’ll-I’ll take a shower tonight. And eat at school-”

“No, no, no. I’ll drive you in. Take your time, okay?”

Thank fuck. 

Awsten couldn’t lie, he was kinda glad that his Mom was driving him in. 

For the last couple of days, the bumpiness of the bus made him feel worse than usual. It wasn’t the usual travel sickness that he got on long car journeys, no. The feeling that he got on the school’s bus was vastly different from that. On the bus, his lower stomach would ache, his fingers and toes would feel numb, and he would…

Need to use the bathroom. Badly. 

At least in his Mom’s car, there wouldn’t be as much stopping-and-starting, and if things really got bad and he needed to ‘go’, he knew that there was a gas station along the route to his school and he could just beg for her to pull in there. 

He nodded, quietly thanking his Mom, and waiting until she reached the bottom of the stairs before darting into the bathroom. Just like he would when he was on the bus, he really had to go. 

And it was a miracle that his Mom did offer to drive him in because, by the time he finished up with the horrors that had just occurred, the bus would have pulled away and been halfway through its trip. 

There was no time to shower if he wanted to get to school on time, even with his Mom driving him in. All he did was splash some water in his face, hastily brush his teeth, throw some clothes on and sprint downstairs. Sitting on the side of the counter was two slices of, now cold, buttered toast.

_ Dread.  _

Dread was the feeling that Awsten felt the moment he saw that. 

Food was meant to help someone going through a growth spurt, surely? From the stuff that he had heard his Mom talk about during long-ass car journeys were that food contained calories, and calories had energy, and it was that energy that helped your body grow, heal cuts, stuff like that. Yet, in Awsten’s body, whenever he ate any sort of food, it would just cause him discomfort. And depending on the type of food he ate, that discomfort could turn into pain. 

“Awsten, grab that toast, get into the car, okay?” His Mom tossed a pair of his vans on the floor space next to him. 

“Not hungry.” He called back out. “Just wanna get to-”   
“No, you’re eating.” She stayed standing next to him, looking down. “Were...Were you just...sick, Awsten?”

“No!” A sharp flash of red exploded onto his face. He didn’t wanna discuss what just happened in that bathroom, fuck. He just wanted to forget about...That. “No, I’m. I’m fine, Mom. Promise. Just not hungry.”

His Mom stood there for a few more seconds. She had to be honest with herself, she didn’t know what she was going to do now. It was blatantly obvious that he was hiding something from her. Something...Serious. It was a difficult situation, as there was no clear or obvious answer. 

She had noticed so many small things over the course of the last couple of weeks. Awsten seemed paler than usual, he had lost a bit of weight, his eyes seemed less colourful, he seemed to be more and more lethargic, and there were nights where she could hear him run constantly, back-and-forth from his bedroom to the bathroom.

Initial thoughts such as bullying came into her head. But he wasn’t refusing school at all. If anything, he seemed more eager to go! He was still going to all his sports activities and such, there wasn’t any refusal there. During Saturdays, he would sit, either, at his desk or the kitchen table and do all his homework, and on Sunday’s go out and teach guitar lessons to three separate kids of three separate families. Everything seemed normal when it came to his routine, yet...Something wasn’t right. It really wasn’t. 

There was nothing about this in any of the books she had read when she was pregnant with Awsten, nor was there any discussion about finding out complicated secrets that your kid was holding and bottling up inside of them. Of course, there was the obvious stuff, like refusing to go to school and pretending to be ill to do so equaling being bullied, but Awsten wasn’t doing any of that!

“You can tell me anything, Aws. You do know that? Right?” She said softly. “I won’t get upset at you, whatever it is.”

“I’m. Fine.” He insisted. 

Logically, he knew that was _a lie._ But he _was_ running late for school, and he really didn’t wanna get into a deep conversation at nearly eight ‘o’clock in the morning. 

Awsten kept up the act of attempting to soothe his Mother’s worries throughout the entire car journey to his school. 

This was despite the pain that was starting to flourish once more inside of his stomach. He had to bite down hard on the skin of his knuckles to stop himself from beginning to cry because of it. How he was going to get through the day, plus the gymnastics class he had right after school for an extra two and a half hours, he didn’t know. If he didn’t have any sort of _embarrassment or shame_ about the predicament he was in, he would have asked his Mom to turn the car around and take him back home where he could wallow in peace. 

But alas, he soon found himself within the confines of his school building, wandering around the halls and trying not to show any signs of the twinges that seemed to rush through his system every couple of minutes. It had only been ten minutes by the time that he was sitting down in his first-period lesson, of maths, but by that stage, his body had already had enough of the day. 

_ Fuck, it was bad. _

Today was worse than any of the other days that he had experienced thus far. 

Instead of the pain coming in single-digit-minute waves every hour, they were lasting up to ten. And then once they went away, instead of the long breaks that he normally would get between them, within another twenty minutes he would be holding back from writhing around in his seat.

Scabby blood trimmed along the edges of his knuckles and cuticles by the time Lunch rolled around. The hem of his shirt had a small wet patch of salvia on it, where he had been sucking on the soft colourful cotton. How anybody hadn't made a comment on his state so far was certainly a shock. 

The second that the bell went he found himself sprinting out of the lesson and straight into one of the many school bathrooms, body being desperate to use it for the entirety of the day. Even though the amount of waste that was inside of his body was barely enough to be eliminated, his body...Still found a way. 

The last couple of weeks were the first times that Awsten had actually used a school bathroom, and he really wasn’t enjoying that fact. 

He lent over himself and hugged his shaky and clammy shins, his chin resting on top of his knees. It felt like a thousand razors were being dragged across the inside of his abdomen, cutting up his internal organs and sending shockwaves of torture up his spine. Yet he still didn’t allow himself to sob and make a scene publically. He was already harassed enough at school, the last thing he wanted was for people to call him a crybaby on top of it all! 

All he could do was let silent tears roll down his face and hope that the pain would soon stop. 

..


	2. You Got Me, Kicking and Screaming

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Awsten's secrets start to spill out, and it's not in the way that he would've liked them to do so.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw for medical stuff, especially blood and vomit !!

For the first time, well, in _forever really_ , Awsten made the willing decision to not go to his Gymnastics lesson after school. Instead, he sulked onto the bus, sat down right at the front, and willed his brain to stay as still as could for the entire forty-minute journey home. His stomach felt like it was on fire by this point and he couldn’t tell if it was from the usual cramping suddenly getting worse, or from the fact that he literally hadn’t eaten anything for the entire day. His vision also seemed distorted, in an odd way. It was vignetted and blurry - he had to take baby steps and hold his arms out a few inches in front of him to stop himself from bumping into everyone and tripping over everything. 

“Awwwwssss-” Fuck. He internally groaned as Gracie, his sister, threw herself down next to him. With the way that he was sitting, leaning up against the window, when she sat down her bag flung itself into his lower abdomen - earning a yelp of pain. “Why you cryin’,bud?” 

“I’m not crying!” Awsten snapped. “I yelled because you hit me with your stupid ass bag-” He adjusted his position, pushing her bag off from his body in the process, and continued to stare straight ahead, willing for the bus to just fucking move already.

“Awsten?” She wasn’t scared, but...Shocked, if anything. Awsten was never the type of guy to _yell_ at somebody, especially his _younger sister_. Yeah, they were siblings, but they got along well with one another. “What’s wrong? You’re not at Gymnastics? Are you...Are you _sick_ , Awsten?” 

He didn’t respond. If anything, he didn’t know _how the fuck_ to respond. 

If he said he felt sick then he would be faced with a barrel of questions as soon as he walked in through the door. 

Yet if he lied and said he felt fine, he would still get asked questions about how and why he wasn’t at his club. 

The only thing he could think of was hiding away from home for the next two-or-so hours (so it seemed as if he went to Gymnastics from his parents perspective) all while trying to convince Gracie not to spill anything to do with his plan. 

That also had its downsides, though. For starters, he really, really wanted to go home. He wanted to just go back to his bedroom and lay underneath his covers, in total darkness, and try and will all of the day away. The last thing he wanted to be doing was walking around the streets of his neighbourhood with a seemingly never-ending pain in his stomach, lowered quality of vision, and with feelings of shakiness that would surely lead to him passing out. 

A small whimper left his lips. 

Tears pricked away at the corners of his eyes. 

Awsten had to admit to himself by this point - he was terrified at what he was going through. 

He knew by this point that it wasn’t growing pains; those didn’t affect your stomach. Not to the extent they were in his body, at least. He was having constant cramping that was only getting worse with each passing hour. No matter what he ate, no matter how much or how little, he would always end up shitting it out within the hour. Sometimes he straight-up puked it out _minutes later_.  Most mornings there would be a thin sheen of stomach acid covering his throat. It would burn and hurt and make him wanna hold onto his neck and sob. Drinking water only temporarily soothed the problem, and it wasn’t until halfway through the day when it naturally faded away.  Whenever he stood up the entire room would spin. His vision would go black and he would have to steady himself on whatever was around him to stop himself from falling over. His sessions at his Gymnastics, Track-and-Field, and swimming classes seemed to have been getting shorter and shorter every single time he went. 

The last swimming class he went to, he spent the entire time alternating between using the only toilet that was by the pool and sitting on the sidelines, the feeling of dangling his feet in the cool liquid enough to make him feel dizzy. 

During Track-and-Field all he could do was run for a few meters before his coach dragged him aside and basically commanded him to sit down and drink something; physically, he was pale and sweaty. Not hot, exactly...Just straight-up clammy. 

And in Gymnastics, all he could do was spot other people. That was it. And even then, he only did it during trampolining sessions where he had something he could lean up against, otherwise, he would just sit on the floor and hope the hours passed by quickly. 

It was a shock that nobody had contacted his Mom about how little energy Awsten had at the moment. Because the people that ran the clubs _were_ noticing, regardless of Awsten knew that  _ they knew  _ or not - it just wasn’t like him! He was always up and about, running around, talking to people, interacting with everybody around him, even the shy-as-fuck kids who were terrified just by looking at all the equipment, let alone using it. He was hyper as all hell, but that’s just who Awsten...Was. And the people at the clubs that he attended loved him because of it. 

“Awsten. Please...I wanna tell Mom-”

“Please no, Gracie please-” Awsten groaned. “I just didn’t feel like going today, alright? It’s not that big of a deal!” 

“You’re crying, though! It’s not nice to see you cry, Aws. You never cry! At anything! Is somebody bullying you? Do I have to beat someone up?”

“No.” Even though another wave of pain was starting to bubble up inside of him, he couldn’t help but chuckle at his younger sister’s attempt to try and protect him. “I can handle myself, Gracie.”

“That must mean you’re ill, then! You didn’t wake up this morning, and you look pale and gross.” She ran her hand across his forehead. “And sweaty.”

If he wasn’t in incredible amounts of agony right now, Awsten would’ve tried and said some sort of witty comeback. He would’ve pushed her back, playfully of course, or do something along those lines. Yet his body seemed to have decided to put him through another bout of torture, causing him to lean back against the window and grit is teeth through it all. 

Gracie definitely knew she had to tell their Mom when they got back. Awsten was ill, and he had been that way for a long time. Even she had noticed his health declining over the past couple of weeks, and she was...Scared. She didn’t wanna show it, but she was so worried for his health. 

She watched Awsten in the corner of her eye as she pulled out her phone, going into the texts and starting up a conversation with their Mom. 

**Gracie:** Mom.

**Gracie:** Awsten isn't going to Gymnastics 2day. I’m worried???

**Momma:** ??

**Momma:** His Gymnastics coach did ring me. He hasn’t had a lot of energy over the past couple of weeks.

**Momma:** Is he with you right now? Does he look okay? 

**Gracie:** No. He’s in pain, he’s holding his tummy and looks pale. 

**Gracie:** :( 

**Momma:** How far away from home are you two? 

**Gracie:** Five mins. 

**Momma:** I’ll meet you at the stop, I don’t want Awsie passing out on you. 

Of course, Awsten was oblivious to all of this. He had his eyes closed and was simultaneously trying to down out the sounds of the people screaming around him and keep the contents of his stomach within his body. 

This fucking sucked.

He had never been so happy to see the bus pull into his street. Even though there were another two or three minutes before it reached the place where it was actually supposed to stop, Awsten already had his hands tightly clutching his bag, ready to jump off and sprint down the street back to his house. In his mind, he had already made the decision that he was going to go straight home and just endure the questions. He didn’t have to answer them - he could just hide up in his room and just ignore everybody until tomorrow morning. It was rude and a big part of him felt bad for doing such a thing, but at the same time-

“Why’s Mom there?” Awsten’s eyes grew wide. Their Mom, sure enough, was standing by the bus-stopping area. Waiting. “Gracie? Why’s Mom there? Di-Did-” The realisation sunk in. “You told her I wasn’t at Gymnastics? What the actual _fuck?!_ ” Panic started to settle in. The absolute last thing he wanted was to get some kind of lecture while walking back to the house. It would be a slow and long walk if such a thing were to happen, and as much as he felt disgusted by it, Awsten was, quite frankly, terrified that he was going to straight-up not  _ gonna make it to the bathroom _ . 

Still. He got off the bus. He stepped off the bus, waited for Gracie to do the same thing, and stood still with his head bowed slightly, waiting for the conversation that was about to ensue. 

“Awsten? Hey, listen-”

“I’m sorry I didn’t go to Gymnastics today.” He blurted out. “I-I just...I didn’t-”

“You didn’t have the energy?” She asked. “Awsten. I know. Coach Daniels told me that you haven’t been yourself in his sessions. No energy, sitting in the corner-”

“Mom.” Yeah, Awsten’s fears earlier about him not making it? He had every right to worry. His gut was currently rumbling in the most uncomfortable way it possibly could and the three of them were a good couple hundred meters away from their home. “I need...Um-” Fuck. He felt so revolting even having to think about this. “I really need the…”

“Go on, you know where the spare key is kept, go run to the bathroom, alright?”

If Awsten had some more control over what his body wanted to do he would’ve actually paused and asked how she knew what he was trying to tell her; the thing was, he didn’t have that much control, so he took that offer and used the little energy he had left and sprinted straight over to the house.

“What’s wrong with Awsten, Mom?” Gracie sighed, looking up at her. “I...He’s not okay. He’s been sleeping too much, he didn’t eat lunch today, and...And he skipped Gymnastics?”   
  
“I’m gonna ask him...Questions. Tonight. Don’t make worry yourself, okay? Listen. Something _is_ up with him, but I’m gonna try my best to help him out.” She knew that she had to do everything in her power to live up to that. The news always sensationalised everything but there were definite horror stories about kids not telling their parents about stuff, then ending up dying in some awful, totally preventable way.

While the two were walking back, discussing Awsten’s health, and trying to piece together every possible bit of odd behaviour they had both witnessed over the last two weeks or so, Awsten  _ himself _ was on the brink of a panic attack in his own bathroom.

He had made it there, which was good news. 

Yet.

The bad news?

There was blood. 

_ A lot of blood.  _

He stood above the toilet, heart having sunk down to the bottom of his ribcage, staring at the toilet bowl full of fucking  _ blood. _ Like, bright red blood. How the fuck was that inside of him?! Is that why he was in so much pain all day? Because of the tidal waves of...that...Was built all up in his bowels and shit? 

His brain was screaming at him to tell his Mom. Fuck, he had to tell his Mom about this shit. Literally. This wasn’t just some weird gut thing that was going on anymore, nor was it even the dumbass growing pain scenario that he had going on within the confines of his skull. No, this was blood. And a lot of it, that is. Not just a couple of specks that could easily be brushed off, no. This was...Well, he couldn’t tell the exact measurement, but it was enough to raise alarm bells. 

There wasn’t any point in holding it back anymore. A strangled, _guttural cry_ lept from the back of his throat as he sunk down to the floor, hands gripping the thin material of his shirt and balling it tightly up. 

_ What the fuck was wrong with him?  _

_ What was his body doing? _

_ Was he doing something to have caused this?  _

_ Was he at fault? _

There was so much revulsion bubbling up inside of him. Why was his body this fucking _disgusting?_

His throat felt tight. His legs were shaking like mad. The room started to spin as a wave of pure nausea rushed over him. He couldn’t control his breathing at this rate - it was uncontrollable. He knew that what he was experiencing was a panic attack, he had gone through the motions of having them a couple of times in the past, yet this one felt thousand times more intense.

“Awsten?” There was a gentle tapping at the door. “Awsten, are you okay in there, baby?” It was his Mom. Her voice was laced thick with worry; and she had every right to be. Awsten couldn’t even talk, let alone move, to try and communicate with her - whenever it was down to the panic coursing violently through his veins or the sudden tsunami of physical exhaustion that had come crashing down on him, he honestly couldn’t tell. “Awsten? Can I open the door? Are you decent?”

No, was the simple answer to the last question. There was a toilet bowl full of blood and he was, well...half-naked. He was the furthest thing from ‘ _decent’_. 

More tears fell. Awsten just wished that none of this was happening right now. He wished that his body just acted normal, he wished he wasn’t about to be caught in the current state he was in, he wished for...Everything to be normal. He felt so  _ sick _ and  _ tired  _ from  _ everything. _

The door started to rattle slightly. Awsten was so out of it that he didn’t even realise. He could feel himself start to pass out and? 

_ To be truthful?  _

He didn’t mind. Even though there was a high chance of him being discovered in the state he was in, he would much rather be found like it while being flat-out cold as opposed to being fully aware of everything that was occurring. 

Awsten’s Mom managed to open the door within a few minutes of picking the lock. 

Her eyes went straight to his body.

He was sitting on the floor with his back resting against the wall with barely-open eyes. Dried tears had strewn themselves across his cheeks, his hair was all ruffled up, and his arms were gently resting in his lap. His breathing was shaky - quiet, but definitely shaky.

She didn’t even see the blood in the toilet until she got closer. 

An instant sinking feeling overcame her. Obviously it would - seeing a toilet bowl full of blood and your own child collapsed next to it would alarm any parent with a functioning heart and soul. 

She knew she couldn’t start visibly showing any signs of distress. The last thing she wanted was to panic Awsten any further. This moment did make her realise exactly why he didn’t say anything about what was going on; talking to your own parent about anything to do with your freaking bowel movements was gonna be humiliating. It shouldn’t be, but it was. She didn’t even wanna know just how long he had been hiding this from her - he had been experiencing the weird, previously unexplained tiredness and weight loss for at least two weeks, so if he had been losing blood every time he went to the bathroom like this…

Fuck. No wonder why he was so exhausted. And pale. And just generally under-the-weather. 

“Oh, bub.” She quickly flushed the toilet and knelt down next to him, brushing strands of hair out from his face and gently pressing a kiss to his forehead. Awsten wasn’t completely out of it like he had just hoped to be; nevertheless he wasn’t fully there, either. Everything was foggy instead of crystal clear, and all he could really feel was the voice and touch that his mother was giving to him. Which was...Nice. And calming, too. “Has this been happening often?” 

She needed to know all the answers. Quickly. Her natural instinct was to rush him straight into the ER, but if she didn’t know how long he had actually been experiencing this issue, then she was going to have little to no information to actually give to the doctors.

All Awsten could do was nod.

It wasn’t verbal, but it was better than nothing.

“How many weeks? Can you hold up your fingers to tell me how many weeks, Awsten?” 

He raised his hand and, somehow, managed to hold up all five of his digits. 

Five weeks. 

That was over a whole month. 

A whole month of symptoms that involved crapping out literal bright-red blood.

It really was becoming hard to hold back any negative emotions. 

“Mo-Momma-” Awsten’s voice had become feeble and almost baby-like. “Hmhph…’M sorry.” 

“Sorry for what, Aws? You have nothing to apologise for, alright? You’ve done nothing wrong, absolutely nothing. Look-” She sighed, standing back up to her feet. “Do you want me to run you a nice long hot bath? So you can relax?”

“Will I be going to the hospital, Momma?” He couldn’t help but have that thought in his mind. There was no point in hiding the fact that Awsten hated going to see any kind of doctor on a given day. So having to go to hospital and talk about his literal shit? It was the last thing he wanted to do, right now. 

“I’m afraid so, Awsten. They’re there to help you though, okay? They’re there to look after you and make you better. Please, I know it’s hard, I know, but please try to not be embarrassed when it comes to talking about bathroom stuff, okay?” 

“But I don’t wanna!” 

“You’re gonna have to, Awsten. I know. I know, I’m not stupid, Awsten; I know it’s embarrassing and tough and painful to talk about it, but you need to.” 

Awsten didn’t reply. He simply stared down at his lap and whimpered softly. 

He was in so much pain. 

So. Much. Pain. 

His stomach was aching, his chest felt tight, his legs felt numb, his arms were tingling, and a strong pounding headache was starting to develop. The streams of light inching in from the bathroom window started to strain his eyes. It felt like he was straining to see through a metal sieve. 

“Can you close the blinds, please?” He asked. “Head hurts. Really hurts…”   
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AhhhHHHH ikik i left it on a bit of a cliffhanger there oop.   
> but yeahh,, i hope y'all are enjoying this :) ! I got a couple of kudos on my last chapter so thank you for that !! pls keep them coming ahaha


	3. You're Not a Monster, Just a Human

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter Three of 'Lovebugs'  
> *  
> Awsten's in hospital, and the realisation of what he's about to face finally sheds to light.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw for hospital test stuff, including things like needles  
> !disclaimer!  
> This is my personal way of venting, I do not wish this to happen to anybody involved in the story. Obviously I don't!

No more memories from that sentence onwards formed within Awsten’s mind, so coming around and realising that he was in a hospital bed, wearing a hospital gown, with nothing but beeping noises all around him was enough to send him into a mild anxiety attack. It really didn’t help that the lights had been dimmed a considerable amount. It was due to the fact that he started complaining more and more of a headache before starting to projectile vomit everywhere, an obvious sign of a migraine, but, of course, he didn't remember that. 

He weakly cast his gaze over to one of the brightest things in the room - the monitor. There were lines on it, but he couldn’t really understand what any of them meant. Another source of light came from the red led that shone out from the white, plastic, pulse oximeter that had been clipped onto the end of his index finger. Through the brain fog, he vaguely remembered learning about them during last semester at school.

“Momma?” His voice was so...dry. His throat felt like all the moisture had been sucked out of it. It didn’t necessarily hurt to talk but he had to put more effort into forming his words, and that was irritating to him. “Momma!” Not having his Mom by his side was slightly terrifying, as well. He was in a hospital, in a random hospital bed, alone. “Momma, I-” There was a tugging feeling in his stomach. And he suddenly remembered exactly the reason why he was in this room in the first place. “Fuck-” He tried to shuffle his legs to the side of the bed, shifting his body weight onto the front of his weakened hips. “Momma?”

The beeping of the monitor started to pick up. 

Now he was _panicking._

The last thing Awsten wanted was to have some kind of soul-crushing accident on a hospital bed. Especially without his Mom here. Yes, as much as the thought of shitting himself around his Mom or Sister was painful, he would take that any day over doing the exact same thing in the presence of a Doctor or Nurse that he had never seen before. 

He couldn’t move. Well, he could. But not much. His body was in so much pain that the simple act of managing to touch his toes on the weirdly-coloured blue flooring was enough to make him hiss out. 

_More beeping._

At least he knew that the noise was coming from his heart monitor, now. He could start to feel the tacky glue that was used to stick the sensors onto his skin pinch at the little hairs that were strewn across his chest. Oh, how badly he just wanted to rip them off and run away from the stupid-fucking-beeping-machine. 

Run towards a bathroom, at least. 

“Awsten?” The door leading into his room cracked open a couple of inches. 

“Momma!” Fuck. He hadn’t been so excited to see his Mom before. “M-M-O-Mom! He-Help, can’t walk-Stand-” His legs felt like they were being dipped in acid and the second he let go of the railing of his bed the room felt like it was spinning around violently. “I jus’ need the bathroom.” He whispered. “Why am I here?”

"I called an ambulance, Aws.” There was no point in lying at this point. “You were vomiting. A lot. You were speaking all slurred and stuff, and all I could get from it was that your head hurt. So. I called for help.” The look of hurt in his eyes as she spoke was painful to see. She knew that anything medical-related was one of Awsten’s biggest fears, and she did everything she could to try and treat whatever ailment he was having at home instead of trekking out to the doctor's office. “There was nothing I could do to help, Awsten. You were so. So. So sick. You know what you’ve been going through for the last couple of weeks more than I do, and yet just from seeing you when you were in that state scared me enough to call for help.” 

One thing that pained his mother more than seeing the look of hurt in his eyes was the fact that he had been hiding this sickness away for so long.

Five, probably more, weeks of...Whatever was going on with his body. The bloodied crap, the paleness, the weight loss, tiredness; it all sounded awful. Terrifying, even. Worse that it was her baby going through this. Yeah, he was a few weeks away from turning seventeen, but he was still her kid.

“I need the bathroom, Mom.” Awsten mumbled. “Really bad.” He, honestly, didn’t have the energy to feel _fully humiliated_ by this situation anymore.

That still didn’t mean that little tendrils of indignity weren’t slipping through the gaps, however. 

Somehow, through a lot of blocking everything out and trying his hardest to focus on what his body was doing, Awsten managed to actually use the bathroom accident-free.

It involved having his Mom run around to locate a wheelchair, having her help him into said chair, having her wheel him into the bathroom that adjoined from his private room, and then back onto the toilet. 

By the end of it, _shame_ was an emotion that was thick within his bloodstream. He laid on the hospital bed with his legs pulled right up to his chest, sobbing as silently as he could into the sheets. Sharp twangs of guilt and discomfort blended in with his overwhelming urge to go back to his own room and relax properly, making a mess of his current mental state. 

“Awsten?” Another voice came into his earshot. One he hadn’t heard before. He didn’t dare roll onto his side to face the direction of where it was coming from, though. His eyes were bound to be bright red and puffy from the tears that he had just shed, and he could feel how the snot running out of his nose pooled around his cupids bow and formed a disgusting shine to his chapped and crusty lips. “Awsten, hey. I’m gonna be your main, primary-care doctor while you’re in here, okay?” 

The person’s voice was...oddly satisfying. It was definitely a thick accent of someplace out of America, but he couldn’t put his finger on a specific location. It didn’t sound Aussie, nor did it sound like it came from a location in Asia. Maybe it was some European country that he didn’t know of? Either way, all Awsten did know was that it was having a calming effect on him. His chest stopped feeling tight, his heart-rate slowed considerably, and he quickly felt the ability to breathe through his nose come to reappear. 

“Listen, we’re gonna need to run some tests on you. Don’t worry, I’ll talk you through every single one of them however many times you want me to do. In fact, you can ask me anything, okay?” The Doctor gently placed their clipboard down on the table next to the bed. “We’ve already done a blood test, alright? We’ve just got the results back, and...And if you want, I can discuss the results with you? Or I can discuss the results just with your Mother?”

“I wanna hear.” He said, “I wanna hear my results.”

“That’s fine with me.” The Doctor paused to smile and sigh slightly. “Do you want your mother to leave the room..?” He had already spoken to Awsten's mom, and he knew that the last thing Awsten would want is for her to leave in this situation, but he also knew that he was a teenager - Teenage patients deserved privacy just as any adult patient did.

“I want her.” That wasn't surprising.

“Okay, she stays then, I guess.” The Doctor looked back up at Awsten’s Mom and shot her a quiet chuckle, before turning his attention back to him. “So. To not bore you with numbers, your immune system is going a bit haywire at the moment. Your white blood cells are going wild, showing a clear sign that there is some kind of infection inside your body right now. Although you probably knew that, without me having to tell you, huh?” 

“Am I gonna die?” Awsten quickly, and rather suddenly, turned himself around. “Like. What do I have? Is it just a cold? Or flu?” White blood cells being raised made his mind go straight to simple illnesses, such as a cold, or because of the fact that he had been admitted into a hospital, severe flu. Despite barely taking any notes during Health class, some of the things discussed did stick in his mind. 

“No, you’re not gonna die, Awsten. Don’t worry about that.” The Doctor quickly moved on. He didn’t like talking about death to anybody, especially not a kid. “Anyways, we’re gonna do some more tests in the next couple of hours. It’s gonna be a usual routine physical, checking your body for anything out of the ordinary. We’re also gonna have to take a sample of urine and stool-”

“W-What’s that...Second one..?”

He already had gathered what it was.

And he felt _sick to his stomach_ about the mere thought of it.

There had never been such a strong urge inside of him to go home until now.

“Am I gonna have to...Y’know…” 

“It’s for your own benefit.” His Mom couldn’t help but lean over and pull him into an awkward, over-the-side-of-the-bed hug, brushing back strands of hair and trying her best to contain herself as he started to shake once more. 

“I...” Awsten furiously wiped tears away from his eyes. He was not gonna cry. He didn’t want to cry. He knew that he had to do this. Like his Mom said, for his own benefit. “It’s fin-e.” There was a break to his voice. 

“Hey, don’t hold back your emotions Aws, it’s okay to be upset. Plenty of people get upset over these sorts of tests; they’re really personal and intimate, it would be odd if you weren’t upset!” The Doctor paused for a moment, gently perching himself on the end of the bed, his own heart tearing slightly at the pure look of horror that covered the boys face. “Look. What I’m trying to say, is let yourself be upset. Let yourself _cry_ , let yourself get _angry_ , let your body feel these _emotions._ ‘Cause if you build them up, then it’s only gonna make the pain worse. Notice how, whenever you cry, you always feel better afterwards? Huh? It’s cause, with things like crying, it's your body’s way of letting sadness out.”

“What other tests do I need’a do?” Awsten asked. He felt...Warm. Warm at the words that this Doctor was saying. He wanted to address him more directly, but he was way too tired to ask for a name or even look for some kind of tag. “I have to get...a physical?” That made him feel scared as all hell. He hated being touched in the places that his past physicians had touched him - armpits, legs, behind the knees, neck, jaw, and...Other regions.

“Mrs Knight, I can assure you, I’ve heard worse.” The Doctor laughed. “Yeah, so basically, there’s gonna be a physical, I’m gonna have to take those samples from you, and tomorrow evening we’re gonna give you some medication, okay?”  
  
That didn’t sound good. 

Awsten knew that he was in a fucking hospital right now, so any medication given to him wasn’t going to be normal over-the-counter painkillers or cough-drops or whatever; it was going to be...Actual Medicine. It was going to taste disgusting! If it was even going to be given orally, that is. You always had some sort of IV in your arm at the hospital, and even though, technically, it was a plastic tube, a needle was still going to be used to actually place the tube within the veins. 

AKA - Needles. 

One of Awsten's biggest phobias.

He really started to take this doctor’s word on not holding back emotions. A quiet whine left his lips as he let his body limply fall back against the uncomfortable mattress of the bed. The last thing he needed was an IV in his arm! He hated needles! Fuck, he was so glad that they had done this blood test while he was still out of it all - If they had come anywhere near him with a needle and a syringe during his vulnerable arrival state then there was a very high chance that he would’ve had a full-blown meltdown. 

“What medicine? Is it bad? Will it hurt? Will I have to get a needle in me? I don’ wanna needle in me! I don-don’t-Like needles! Needles hurt, I hate them! I hate them so much, I-I don’ wanna be poked!” Awsten started to gag. “I don’ wanna it to hurt!” 

“Rest assured, no needles, buddy. This medicine isn’t going to use a needle, no. Now, this medicine is gonna, well, _clear you out,_ we need to do a test called a colonoscopy, okay? And your insides need to be all clear before we go up and check everything out.” 

“It sounds like it’s painful. Like...It sounds painful.” He had read up about colonoscopies for one reason or another, probably for some sort of science or health class, and he was fucking terrified at the thought of getting one himself. It involved a camera going up an asshole and looking around the entirety of the large intestine; no painkillers and no being put to sleep. He was going to be fully conscious. Fully aware of everything that was going on. “Will it hurt badly? E-Even without a needle, will it hurt?” 

“I’m going to try my best to make everything as comfortable as possible for you. We can give you stuff like laughing gas. Have you ever had laughing gas, Awsten? They often give it to people at dentists?” 

“No.” Awsten bluntly replied. “My teeth are healthy. I haven’t ever had laughing gas.” Even the term ‘laughing gas’ made him feel sick - what kind of gas made you laugh? And how was he meant to use said gas and laugh through the pain of having a device be shoved up inside and moved around his body? Sounded fake. “Do I have to have that Scopy test? What does it even show..?”  
  
“It’s gonna see if your insides are inflamed. As I said, tomorrow evening we’ll give you the medicine, and it’ll do its job overnight. Then the day after that, you’ll be able to properly clear yourself out, and just before you go to bed we can quickly use the colonoscopy to look around.” The Doctor sighed, patted Awsten’s leg, before rising up to his feet. “A nice nurse is going to come around in a couple of minutes and give you some pots, Awsten. They’re for taking the samples that I mentioned earlier. I’m gonna give you a little while for you to do take them, and then I’ll come back round to take them, plus perform the physical. Does that sound alright to you?”

No.

_It didn’t sound 'alright' to him at all._

The last thing he wanted to do was piss and shit in some glass tubs, get touched up, wait a day, be given a laxative and then have a camera be rammed up inside of him. He wasn’t really a social character, but there were so many other things that he wanted to do with his time. So many other things that didn’t involve being trapped in a hospital! 

He felt like crying again. No tears were coming, though. He had cried them all out. Or he was too exhausted to actually let himself sob. Or a mixture of the both! At this rate, he hadn’t the foggiest clue.

“Awsie, baby. You’re gonna be okay. I know this sucks, but you’re in the best hands possible. Doctor Murphy-” He presumed that was the person’s name. “Is going to take amazing care of you. I can tell from the look in his eyes that he truly does care for you, Awsten. But you have to listen to what he says. If he asks you to give a sample, then try your best to give it. If he wants to run a test on you, then let him. You’re...Unwell, Awsten. Sick. Not to a life-threatening degree, but you’re very, very sick. And it might be a while until you’re able to come home-”

“I don’t wanna do any of that! I want to go home! I don’t wanna give him my piss! Or shit! Or-Or anything, Mom!” Awsten snapped. 

Rage started to rush through his body. He was so tired of all the hospital stuff already and it hadn’t even been twelve hours yet. 

Fuck it, it hadn’t even been _ten hours!_

Awsten was already loathing all the stuff that he had just found out he had to do, and he knew that was only going to be the beginning of it. 

After the stupid samples had been taken, after the physical was done, and after the colonoscopy had been performed, there was going to be more tests. 

_More tests. More samples. More touching._

_Needles_ were going to get involved, he just knew it!

He didn’t care about the pain of things anymore. Using what little strength his body had left, he dragged himself off the bed and onto his, wobbly, legs. 

His mother was yelling out his name as he stumbled out of his hospital room door and into one of the ward’s hallways. Of course, he didn’t give a damn - nothing mattered anymore. He was going to be stuck in this building for a long long time, and he was damn-fucking-angry about it. Doctor Murphy’s speech about showing emotions was playing back in the teenager's mind; he was mad. He was angry. He was fucking fuming. And he wasn’t going to let himself hold back those emotions. 

Each step he took made more spikes of pain run through his spine. His stomach hurt like fuck, too. 

For a split second, he heavily considered going back. But then his mind went straight back to the idea that, no, he was _angry_ , and he deserved to _show his frustrations._

Would punching a wall make him feel calm? Kids at school punched holes in the walls all the damn time, and they always blamed it on their anger-issues. Yet Awsten, as much as he felt angry, didn’t want to cause _problems for other people._

His hands moved up to his scalp. Hitting himself here would be like hitting a wall, right? Just without the effect on other people? Nobody would have to deal with plastering up any dents or holes if he went straight to hitting himself. 

Doctor Murphy stood down at the other end of the hall. 

He had been observing Awsten for the last couple of minutes - the boy had come out of his room, took a few steps, and had stumbled right onto the floor. It was crystal clear that he was going through a rollercoaster of emotions right now, and honestly? He couldn’t blame the kid. All he could do was make his life a little bit easier. 

This was going to be tough, though. Awsten was definitely one of those people that had an extremely stubborn mind - if he wanted something to happen, then he knew for damn sure that i was going to happen. If he didn’t want something to happen, then he was going to do everything in his power to ensure that it wasn’t going to happen. 

“Buddy?” Murphy knelt down next to him. “Hey. What’s w-”

“I don’t want these stupid samples! I don’t see the point in all of this! I don’t see the point in any- _any of this!_ I’m not _dying!_ I’m not on the brink of _fucking death_ -!” Awsten’s voice only increased as he began swinging his arms around, blinded by rage. He felt like a _monster._ “I’m just shitting a lot! That’s all that’s happening! I don’t get it! I don’t get any of this...I ju-just-want-” He didn’t know what he ‘just wanted’ to do.

Anger had melted back into sadness.

He felt hopeless. _So very hopeless._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ahhh sooo yeah, another chapter done. ik this chapter is kinda,, grusome? luckily it doesn't get 'worse' after this ahaha.  
> aka i promise cute stuff happens soon!


	4. Bittersweet

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter Four of 'LoveBugs'   
> \----  
> Awsten finally gets the answer to his question, but is it what he wanted?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw for;  
> needles, medications, and other hospital stuff.

The tests were something that Awsten wished he had never agreed to do.

While, objectively, they weren’t all that bad, the mental strain of it all made him sob harder and harder with each passing hour. Everything was just so overwhelming – Touches felt like ice dribbling down his skin, needles felt as if somebody was cutting up his tendons, and every time a section of his bare body was exposed to the cool air of the hospital, waves of shame would drown him whole.

All these tests meant that he was coming closer to being able to pack up and leave for home. Out of everything, that was the only thing keeping him going.

“Awsten!” Gracie nudged his shoulder. “Are you even _listening_ to me?” Oh yeah, the fact that his family were starting to arrive comforted him a little, too. It was odd – having his younger sister talk on and on about randomly, most-likely useless information would be enough to drive him mad a few months ago. Now? Now, it was…Nice.

“Yeah, totally was.” He mumbled.

He was a shitty liar.

There was no denying that.

Still, he didn’t want to make her upset.

And somehow, she believed him.

“What do you wanna call the cat? The one Mom got-”

“Mom got a cat? When? Like, a _new one?_ ” Fuck. He really hadn’t been paying attention.

“It’s a black one, look-” She pulled out her phone and showed Awsten a photo. It was of a small, black kitten, with deep green eyes. It was...Tiny. “-She’s a girl, we think. Mom found her at the side of the road, so we took her to the vets, and they said that there was no microchip or anything, so we decided to keep he-”

“Jet!” Awsten beamed. “Jet, call her Jet! Like, jet black, the colour!” 

“Oh-Kay…” Gracie forced herself to hold back a laugh at her older brothers child-like mindset. She would’ve laughed, but she didn’t want his current manner to stop. She had felt as if she had lost any connection with him over the last couple of weeks, him either sleeping or locking himself in the bathroom when they weren’t at school, and now...things finally seemed to be getting back to normal. “Jet it is, then. I’ll tell Mom when she comes back in-hey, wait? Where even _is she?_ Didn’t she go out to talk to the Doctor or something?”

“I dunno. Murphy likes to talk. And I like it. He’s got a cute accent, y’know? It’s an Irish one! He’s from Ireland!”

That was something new Awsten had learnt. His Doctor was Irish. 

There were a lot of things that he had learnt from him, actually.

During the moments where Awsten would be panicking over something, he would sit down and start talking about his childhood. Doctor Murphy had grown up in Cork, a place right in the south of the country. He spoke about the pretty houses that were there, how his father had a fishing company, and even made jokes about the crappy airline ‘Ryanair’. These conversations were more one sided, with Awsten simply listening, but it worked in distracting him.

Doctor Murphy, or just ‘Murphy’ as Awsten liked to call him, definitely _looked_ Irish. Stereotypically, that is. Extremely pale skin complexion, covered like fuck in freckles, and shocking ginger-hair. He also had a stubble beard and bright blue eyes. Awsten wasn’t really too sure of if the eye colour was a stereotype, but they still looked pretty. 

And, just like that, Murphy came back into Awsten’s room.

He knocked first, as he always did, before waiting for Awsten’s response of ‘come in’ before stepping inside. 

A look of hesitation and _dread_ was plastered on his face. A few paces behind him was the Knight’s mother, looking...Terrified, for lack of a better term.

“Momma?” Awsten himself started to panic. He could feel his chest tense up, his heart racing, and his vision becoming darkened. “W-W-What’s happening?”

“Awsten, hey, _so…_ ” Murphy sat down on the edge of Awsten’s bed. “Do you want me to tell you the results of, well, all the tests we took? Or do you want your Mom to tell you?” Awsten didn’t even have to give a verbal response. He just carried on looking straight at his Doctor, nodding and blinking slowly. “Okay. So. You have Ulcerative Colitis.. Do you know what that is?”

_Ulcerative Colitis._

_It didn’t sound...Bad?_

“No? What’s that? Am I gonna die from it?” Surely that must be the only reason his Mom was upset. Awsten wasn’t scared...Like, hearing that word didn’t make his blood run cold or his bones rattle, it just felt like another word. 

“It’s not a fatal disease, so no, you won’t die from it. Basically, Ulcerative Colitis is an autoimmune disease, meaning that your immune system, which is what fights off coughs and colds, just...Well, just decides to attack your colon. Hence why you’ve been having trouble in that area.” Murphy felt awful about breaking this sort of news to any patient, let alone a young teenager who had their entire life ahead of them. He was just so fucking thankful that Awsten seemed to be taking this news well. He was sitting on the bed, legs crossed, nodding and genuinely listening to every word he was saying. “It affects your large intestine and rectum-”

“Gross-” Gracie couldn’t help herself from speaking. 

“Gracie.” Mrs. Knight shot daggers at her, wiping even more tears from her eyes as she leaned up against the wall. She didn’t even know why she was crying so much - she was a health teacher, she knew that colitis wasn’t the end of the world, but...but her baby had it. Yes, Awsten was a teenager, but he was still her _baby._

“Anyways, it affects those parts of your body, hence why you’ve been experiencing symptoms in those areas.”

“Will I be...Fucked up forever? Like, w-will I have to keep coming back to hospital all the time? Will I have to take, like…Injections, and stuff..?”

“Well, yes. And also no. Yes, in the sense that you will have this disease forever. It isn’t really that curable. There are no known cures for colitis.” He paused for a moment, quickly assessing the situation. Awsten wasn’t crying or panicking or doing anything of the sort – He was just sitting there, staring intently at him, hanging onto every word he spoke. “Also, yes, in the sense that you’ll have to take medication forever. Not injections, though. It’s a pill every day. And, whenever you’re feeling really crap, like how you were feeling, say, eight weeks ago, then you take another pill. You’ll only have to come into hospital for the casual check-up and, if stuff goes really bad, for extra treatment. But, if you keep up with all your meds, and make sure to tell people when you’re feeling rough, then you’ll live a normal life.”

Awsten didn’t really know how to react.

On the one hand, he was thankful at the fact that he wouldn’t have to spend the rest of his life moving in and out of hospital. He was also glad that he wouldn’t have to experience getting injections every day. Yet, on the other hand, he was also…Worried. While he was fine doing so, he didn’t really like taking pills. He often had to cut them up and swallow multiple gulps of water in order to take one half of a tiny pill, so the idea of having to take, at the very least, one every single day…It didn’t feel all that good.

Anything was better than hospital, though.

_Literally fucking anything._

“What do I have to take, then? W-What pills? A-And…And can I go home after them-like, after taking them?”

“So, here’s the plan,” Murphy clasped his hands and stood back up again, quickly grabbing and glancing down at his clipboard. “We’re going to start you on some steroids. These are going to be the meds you take while you’re ill, in a ‘flare-up’, as we call it. This will stop your gut from being so inflamed and painful, okay? Then, after twenty-four hours on that, we’ll give you a repeat prescription of immunosuppressants, and we’ll monitor you for another twenty-four hours after taking them. Then, if everything goes well, and you have no adverse reactions, we can discharge you-“

“So…Home? I can go home?”

“Yes, yes!” Murphy couldn’t help but laugh loudly. Watching Awsten’s face beam was so heart-warming. “Home. Soon. But, we will need to have a discussion about long-term plans, alright? As I said, we’re going to start you on immunosuppressants, and as the name suggests, these will suppress your immune system. And…And you’re a smart boy, Awsten. You know your immune system is what prevents you from getting sick with things like the cold and flu, so if it gets suppressed, you’re more likely to get sicker from those minor illnesses.”

“Will…Will I have to stop going to school, then? Cause everyone is always _sick_ at school…?”

“No, no, not at all. But you will have to start _protecting_ yourself, so wearing things like masks during school, and not seeing friends if they say they’re ill, that sort’a stuff.”

Awsten could understand why his Mom was tearful by this point. Even though logically, he knew that he could do all that stuff, it still sounded…A lot to deal with.

Geoff, to begin with, always seemed to get some sort of cough or cold. So the thought of not being able to see him whenever he was in that state…Hurt.

There was also the fact that there was the whole pill-taking thing, too. Chances were, these pills weren’t going to be small, either. They were gonna be those _painfully massive ones_ that felt as if you were choking every time you swallowed them.

“Ok-ay.” He nodded again and averted his gaze down to his lap. “What happens if those medications don’t work? Will I have to come back to the hospital?”

“It depends. Well! You will, for sure, need to come back to hospital. But there are more than one type of steroid and immunosuppressant. Although...If we try all those medications, and none of them work, we will need to do, well, surgery. It’ll involve removing your large intestine, and pulling a small part of your small intestine out through the abdominal wall-”

“No.” Fear started leaking back into his system.

He hated the idea of surgery. He hated the idea of having somebody controlling his consciousness level. He hated the fact that surgery meant injections, which he also hated.

“I don’t want surgery.”

Awsten didn’t even know what sort of surgery he would be getting. What he did know was that was the last thing he wanted.

“Alright. I’ll speak to you more about that at a later date, then. Uh, have anymore questions?”

“N-No-” He shook his head once more. The news was…a lot to take in, and that was downplaying the situation. “Can I just get my meds, then?

All he needed was those meds. Those pills. Then, even if he still felt somewhat awful, he would be able to somehow fake wellness and be able to relax at home.

He just wanted to go the fuck home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahhh i'm sorry I haven't updated in so long !! I'm gonna go and re-edit the previous chapters sometime next week to make them sound better and stuff so! yeah!

**Author's Note:**

> UM so idk how well this is gonna go down lmao. let me know what you think so far???


End file.
